HELENA You do advance your cunning more and more.
When truth kills truth, O devilish holy fray!
These vows are Hermia’s: will you give her o’er?
Weigh oath with oath, and you will nothing weigh.
Your vows to her and me, put in two scales,
Will even weigh, and both as light as tales.
LYSANDER I had no judgement when to her I swore.
HELENA Nor none, in my mind, now you give her o’er.
LYSANDER Demetrius loves her, and he loves not you. (3.2.128-136)
Helena is angry, confused, hurt, self-righteous: you do advance your cunning more and more, you’re being extreme, outlandish, ridiculous. What are you playing at? What are you DOING? Do you think you’re being clever? (Of course she thinks there’s an ulterior motive to what Lysander’s saying, that this is some kind of dreadful plot.) When truth kills truth, O devilish holy fray! It’s a kind of blasphemy, swearing all these vows first to one woman, then another, and all the while protesting the truth of what you’re saying. It’s FIENDISH! EVIL! These vows are Hermia’s; everything you’re swearing to me you owe to her really, don’t you? are you telling me that you’ve chucked her? Will you give her o’er? Weigh oath to oath, and you will nothing weigh: everything you’re vowing to me right now is cancelled out by everything you’ve previously vowed to her. None of it counts! Your vows to her and me, put in two scales, will even weigh, and both as light as tales. It’s all just empty words, wind, NOTHING. You total lightweight! (The up-and-down scales, dangling in the breeze, recall the proverbial weathercock of women’s supposed inconstancy.) Stop making stuff up! I had no judgement when to her I swore, protests Lysander. I wasn’t thinking straight, I was young and foolish! Nor none, in my mind, now you give her o’er: you still ARE, you idiot! You’re still making a complete fool of yourself, acting completely unreasonably, retorts Helena. Why should I believe a word you say? Lysander tries to spell it out, with his own intoxicated logic: Demetrius loves her—Hermia—and he loves not you. That’s the state of it, isn’t it? And with that at least, Helena must, for now, agree…
